Folks may never fully understand what it is to enjoy a title like Princess Maker. At its core, it’s a bizarre affair: suddenly doing a sim game where you dictate the life and choices of a young girl through adolescence and into adulthood. It’s something that, when taken out of context, feels utterly creepy and unsettling, and that’s perfectly fair. Then again, people have been crafting nightmare realities in Sims 4 for more than a decade now, and it’s almost a mainstay install on many a bored person’s computer. Still, the specific appeal of Princess Maker 2 is something that is unique in a way that can be hard to describe. Even more so when you consider this is the THIRD release of the same game, now with Princess Maker 2: Regeneration.

Considering the original was crafted in 1993, Princess Maker 2 is a game that has lived through a tumultuous existence. It was ported to the 3DO, the Sega Saturn, the PlayStation 2, and, believe it or not, DOS (the first release was on the PC-98). It got a full-fledged English translation in 1996, and then the localization company went bankrupt, preventing commercial sales but encouraging people with review copies to share the wealth with the digital underground. Considered one of the most well-received titles that never actually got sold, it spurred current rights holder BlissBrain to put Princess Maker 2 onto Steam back in 2016 as Princess Maker 2 Refine. Dolled up with HD graphics and added voice work, it was an admirable retelling of the original endearing game.

Which brings us to Regeneration. The main update here is the console release, which helps add Princess Maker 2 to the Switch’s very limited Princess Maker accessibility. The graphics have been touched up yet again, this time going back and redoing many of the stills and portraits to fully capture the initial vibe of the original title, while also acknowledging the updated displays and color potential of modern monitors and televisions. Lastly, there’s an opening animation that’s meant to emulate some of the intent and ideas from the game as it was first envisioned. The concept is to make a 90s-style opening that gives you snapshots of characters, possibilities, and elements that’ll be central to the game’s progression.

Like other Princess Maker titles, the mission is to successfully raise your daughter from the age of ten to eighteen and dictate her month-by-month life in terms of study, work, diet, and exploration. In comparison to Princess Maker Refine, choices are far more robust for what happens in the course of thirty days. Schoolwork is expensive but can unlock many potential job and relationship avenues for the budding princess. You have a more personal connection to your surrogate daughter, allowing you to converse more freely, explore different vacations together, and also have a better handle on her behavior and upbringing. For example, if she becomes truant or moody you can have your butler follow her around and make sure she doesn’t cause mischief. Inversely, a very amicable or happy princess will be more open about her needs and wants, allowing for successful development.

There’s two ways to view Princess Maker 2 Regeneration, or three if you’re being picky. The first is as a Switch player exclusively, meaning this is the be-all-end-all exposure to the series. In that instance, you’ve really set yourself up for the best encounter. Switch players only have access to Princess Maker ～ Faery Tales Come True ～, which is a considerably worse port and also a harder experience. Princess Maker 2 is generous for new players in both emergency funds, the frequency of stipends from the castle, and in your daughter’s forgiveness. While some choices are more limited, they also have fewer caveats: for example, your daughter can lean into either decorum and diplomacy OR adventuring and toughness, and both are financially viable without knowing a lot of the game’s strategies. This clear pathway to your first couple of endings is really helpful for newcomers.

Additionally, the voicework update that came from Refine is still present and delightful as ever. Rather than trying to waste time on even more work, BlissBrain did well with preserving some excellent adjustments that were implemented the last time they released Princess Maker 2. The voices add a lot to the overall tone and effect of the storyline, letting this sim game separate from more traditional titles and adding an almost visual novel element to events as they unfold. I particularly like the inflections and shift from disdain to grudging admiration as your stats improve and you become more “ladylike” (their words, not mine).

However, Princess Maker 2 Regeneration still has some flaws even as a standalone piece of work. For one, it feels like there were optimization issues in getting this game out onto what is arguably an underpowered piece of hardware. Things feel sluggish at times, particularly if you’re adventuring, where the princess enters a top-down Zelda adjacent gameplay area. The delay is felt in choices and even trying to scroll through menus, which is just silly. This title is, by all accounts, three decades old and was coded to work on machines that ran at 5 MHz. At the end of the day, it’s a bunch of text, some static photos, and numbers that change depending on fixed variables. It’s like if Microsoft put out Solitaire on modern PCs and the cascade of cards when you won caused a kernel panic.

Additionally, there are text issues every which way but loose. The font has trouble loading on occasion, and random symbols will crop up during moments of purchase for several things, including giving your daughter pocket money. The game attempts to let you force text forward at different speeds, but it just results in lag and more downtime of not doing anything in a game that’s mostly reading to begin with. When you get to something like the Harvest Festival, it’s utterly unbearable to sit there and watch the game plod out dancing, painting, or fighting in stages that each feel longer than the last. When your daughter inevitably loses in her first Festival, you just have to sit there and wait for the rest of the event to conclude which can feel arduous to the point of zoning out.

Plus, there are arbitrary bugs that exist in Princess Maker 2 Regeneration that seem to have no rhyme or reason. Jobs will suddenly become impossible no matter what your daughter’s base skills are. I was perfect in cooking and housekeeping but couldn’t do a single day at the inn. My brute strength and stamina were sky high in another playthrough but a single brick was never successfully laid when I tried masonry. As far as I can tell, the Faith bug from Refine still exists, so players looking for pious endings need to be wary if their inventory becomes too full. These are things that you can excuse away when you’re playing a title that predates The Foo Fighters, but a modern title that’s asking a modern price needs to be a lot more polished and ironed out.

Then there’s the problem that Regeneration is inferior to Refine in almost every way imaginable. I personally like the coloring better on Refine’s updated graphics: Regeneration has a glossy sheen to it that feels like AI assistance even if none exists. The text formatting looked a lot better on Refine and could also be read better. The game feels more natural with a mouse and keyboard versus joystick and buttons, though I give a lot of credit to Blissbrain for making a port where controls were the least of my worries. That opening animation feels more like a fan-created trailer than a serious implementation of the talent that I know exists in the world of game creation, and that feels awful to say. I love the Princess Maker series (even the bizarre board game) but this just doesn’t hit well in terms of performance or delivery.

People will probably take a stand about the removal of certain elements in the game, and that’s the one place where I wholeheartedly approve of the changes. It’s weird to think that, in 1993, developers looked at raising a girl to adulthood and thought “Let’s put her in risque leather clothes and then have her become a whore if the planets align,” and that somehow got a pass.

Princess Maker 2 wasn’t considered adult or vile in its day, but this is a different, better world where maybe some things can be left behind and we can stop trying to make them happen. Switch players have access to all the endings and they’re no better or worse than Refine portrayed them, meaning, great, you can still marry your daughter, but you can’t put her in a fetish dress and ogle her during gameplay. See? It’s still weird, but it’s less of a crime.

I will never stop adoring Princess Maker 2, and I’m proud that I bought Refine on Steam to help fund and support the preservation of the Princess Maker games. I really enjoyed Princess Maker 5 and hoped it would be the start of something new, even with localization issues. But Princess Maker 2 Regeneration is several poorly chosen condiments on top of a really good burger. The meat is still delicious, but the addition of sauerkraut, garlic butter, dragonfruit, and a banana bread bun makes it confusing and unpalatable. I’m going to keep playing it because I love what’s at the center, but I wish there was a better way to enjoy it. If you’ve only got a Switch, play Regeneration and do your best to overlook the mistakes. Otherwise, with PC access, you can still support BlissBrain and grab Refine instead. It’s the royally right choice.

 

Graphics: 6.0 Updated portraits and settings feel like they were machine improved instead of being fully done by hand. Some weird blurring around menu edges adds to the uncanny feeling. Having said that, it’s a great presentation that does mostly capture the original elements of the game.	Gameplay: 7.0 A beautiful balance of simulation and action that gives the player more involvement than the first title but far less complexity than future installments. Action areas leave something to be desired, and the learing curve is steep for newcomers. However, it does have a satisfying number of payout endings.
Sound: 8.0 Love the voicework, love the soundtrack, soundscape is positive overall. There are times where the lines overlap if multiple characters talk and you advace the text too quickly, but that’s less about the sound and more about the fuction.	Fun Factor: 5.0 Princess Maker 2 is such a fantastic game, and this incarnation is just not the best version of itself. Poorly optimized, glitchy and very pricy, it’s hard to justify its existence when a better release already exists on PC. But, as a console only take, it’s a fine title indeed.
Final Verdict: 6.0

Princess Maker 2 Regeneration is available now on PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation 5.

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch.

A copy of Princess Maker 2 Regeneration was provided by the publisher.